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The reform of the Swedish pension scheme (ATP) illustrates a surprising ability among Swedish politicians to sidestep entrenchced partisan conflicts and establish consensus. Although several studies set out to explain the comparatively successful reform, the significance of new, and exclusive, institutions for decision-making has largely been overlooked. The hypothesis of this article, however, suggests that the creation of these new institutions is what really explains the Swedish success story. In order to test the hypothesis, decisions and negotiations leading up to the reform are process-traced, and opinions among voters and central actors that were excluded from the process are explored. The results indicate that the pension reform was made possible by the highly restricted decision-making process, and also cast doubts on whether the same pension reform would have been possible without it. These new institutions for decision-making, however, might have negative consequences for the future functions of representative democracy. Adapted from the source document.

This article examines the relationship between media & the partisan ministerial staff of the Government Office. The main objective of the article is to make a contribution to the knowledge about & comprehension of how medialization has affected the work of the partisan ministerial staff. The article is empirically based on four focus groups, with respectively ministers, secretaries of state, political advisors & press secretaries working under the third Persson government (2002-2006). The article demonstrates that media management is an area that The Government Office was not originally adapted for. Therefore media & communication do not enter into the existing routines & formal decision-making processes of the organization. As a result, media challenge both the process behind the government's collective decision-making & the up-holding of the impression that the government decides collectively. Thus, there is a need for complementary routines for the contacts between the partisan staff & the civil servants. Adapted from the source document.